The Flaming Trees

In which we get out on our fourth backpack of the season, and I am attacked by a R.O.U.S (Rodent of Unusual Size)!!!!

With three fall backpacks under our belt and a few decent days coming up, my husband and I discussed backpack #4. Should we head for the Hammersley Wild Area, which is further away, and an even harder backpack than Quehanna? Or should we go back to one of our more local spots that isn't quite as far or hard a walk?

In the end, we opted to go back to our campsite in Moshannon State Forest, above Black Moshannon State Park. I'd heard the colors were getting nice up on the hill, and those rumors were true. I'd also seen a couple of pictures of this year's colors along the lake, and I wanted to try my hand at a few shots of my own!

So Tuesday morning found us loading our gear into the car, and by early afternoon, we were walking in to our campsite in Moshannon State Forest. Again, the weather was quite mild, and the temps would not even get close to freezing at night. The foliage was lovely, the sky was blue, the sun was shining. Bingo! What a good pick!

We had no difficulty at all finding our way in, tied our Walmart bag to the one tree for navigation, and then finished hiking in to our site. We both had library books along and I was trying to plow through one quickly, as I have about four of them due in less than a week, and not nearly enough time to finish them all! A tree has fallen down since our last visit, and it now provides a convenient place to sit and read. How nice!

The New Moose went along on his first ever backpack, and Little Bear, Alex the Alligator, T. Tiger, Lil RBG, and Quetzal were all there to keep him company. I looked over at one point and saw Ruth riding the New Moose through the golden ferns at top speed. Hey, girl, watch out! You're going to get a TICKET if you don't slow down! What adventures they are already having together!

And yes, gold is the color of the day, for almost all of the trees and many of the ferns have gone to gold. Whether the sun is shining or not, there is yellow light in the woods, and it seems to be coming from the trees. Serious magic is afoot, the mid-October kind!

The last time we camped in this spot, a porcupine wandered through our camp and past my tent (like, less than a foot away), and then scurried about 70 feet up a tree when it saw me! So of course, the first thing I did was to check the sky for falling porcupines. As you can see (look UP!), there are no porcupines, hanging in trees, waiting to fall on unsuspecting backpackers. (Thank goodness for small favors!) But the foliage view is outstanding.

The moon came up a little after 8 p.m. and shone a wonderful natural light down on our little adventure. We watched the moon show through the trees, and eventually made our way into our tents for the night. My husband's tent is typically some distance from mine - we are close enough to shout at each other but not close enough to hear each other snore!

I'd settled into my tent for the night and gone to sleep, but I was awakened sometime after midnight by a scuffling sound. It sounded like some small animal was truffling around in the nearby dry leaves. But the sound seemed like it was coming from behind my backpack, or around it. So I had reason for concern. Gotta protect the gear!

Well, in the woods, you have three modes of fighting back at your midnight attackers: make a loud noise, jump out and startle them, or shine a light. Since my husband was sleeping not far away, I didn't want to start screaming, and I didn't feel like jumping out of my tent for ANYthing, let alone an attacker.

So what did I do? I shone my light all over the place, and made a tiny noise, and as I moved the light all around, suddenly I saw a Rodent of Unusual Size (or R.O.U.S.) come leaping out of my pack! It stopped for just a second, seeming to be blinded by my light!

We'll leave our intrepid adventurers right here at this moment, which turned out to be about 1 a.m., when I checked my watch with my flashlight. Let's see what happens next in tomorrow's episode of As the Backpackers' World Turns. For now, as we have a R.O.U.S. lit up by our flashlight, here's our soundtrack song: Bruce Springsteen, with Blinded by the Light.